Beyond the Limits of Language Reading the Evolution of E.M. Forster's Prophets Through the Philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein

This thesis explores E.M. Forster's ethics of "human relations" and how Forster links this creed to a specific sense of language and meaning, which he reevaluates throughout his literary career. Forster's ethical-linguistic reinterpretations can be understood through the philosophical lens of Ludwig Wittgenstein's own evolving philosophy--through the shifts between his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and his Philosophical Investigations . Within his novels Forster centralizes his ethics in a prophet figure. The elder Mr. Emerson from A Room with a View , the first Mrs. Wilcox from Howards End , and Mrs. Moore from A Passage to India , are perhaps the most well-defined and recognizable of Forster's prophet figure; they will be the focus of this thesis. By tracing the evolution of Forster's prophet figure this project will show how Forster gradually interrogates a Tractarian sense of language and ethics and moves towards the more relative sense of meaning Wittgenstein presents in the Investigations .